Chapter 567: The First Murder Scene
No matter what, he couldn’t stay here any longer.
After getting out of the car, Xu Huo opened the rear door, releasing the airborne fungi that filled the vehicle. He then tied a desert windmill to the ground with kite string, letting the sandstorm sweep the floating particles in all directions. Taking advantage of this moment, he went to the research institute and swept away the fungal specimens and the complete fungal encyclopedia.
Afterward, he put away his props and used "Straight Line Distance" to accelerate between two points, quickly leaving the scene.
He hadn’t sensed the person in the bell tower, but shortly after he left, Yuan Cun and several players caught up.
Xu Huo put on his protective suit, covering his eyes, ears, mouth, and nose completely. As he swooped down, he scraped the ground, broke through the surface, and leaped into the underground nest.
“Using that trick again!” Yuan Cun, who was chasing him, feared the surging fungal threads underground and didn’t go down. He said to the other players, “I’ve locked onto him—follow me!”
Xu Huo ran underground while they chased above ground, heading in the same direction. Yuan Cun was slightly faster, even overtaking Xu Huo and directly using props to destroy the city’s surface.
Xu Huo had already anticipated this move. When he went down, he deliberately went deeper, at least to a depth where the opponent couldn’t easily penetrate from the surface. As expected, when the nest ahead collapsed, he accelerated and rushed in before the rock and soil completely buried the underground passage, successfully crossing the destroyed area.
Little Pink Hat was still near the protective wall, so he had to go retrieve the awakened puppet.
He sprinted all the way, finally reaching the area around the collapsed protective wall. But Yuan Cun and his group seemed certain he would try to cross the wall, so they had already blocked the way there.
After the wall collapsed, almost all the underground cracks nearby were buried, making it impossible to pass. Xu Huo was still several hundred meters away from where he had left the awakened puppet.
“You’re not dumb enough to be buried, are you?”
A round object pushed up through the fungal threads in a ditch near his feet. As the words fell, the object flew out and smashed toward the back of his head: “You’re the dumb one!”
Xu Huo turned and caught the awakened puppet, then reached out to pull up the dirty Little Pink Hat, smiling as he said, “I knew you’d find a way to escape.”
Little Pink Hat pouted. “You adults aren’t honest—what you say to our faces is different from what you say behind our backs.”
“Of course. When people grow up, they grow an extra layer of face,” Xu Huo said, brushing the dirt off her skirt. “You’ll have one too when you grow up.”
Little Pink Hat looked at him suspiciously. “Really? Where’s your extra face? Where are you hiding it?”
Xu Huo touched her head. “You’ll know when you grow up.”
Staring at his face, Little Pink Hat quickly snapped out of it. “You’re lying!”
Xu Huo chuckled. “Hurry back. Someone’s coming.”
Little Pink Hat reluctantly climbed into the awakened puppet but reminded him, “Don’t forget my new dress.”
Xu Huo naturally agreed. He wasn’t planning to leave Clown City yet, so he needed to find a way over the protective wall.
Fighting Yuan Cun’s group would cost too much... Looking deeper into the nest, he took out the “Fifty-Fifty Window.”
The “Fifty-Fifty Window” could only be used in non-instance spaces. If the Clown City instance had ended, this prop would allow him to teleport once within the city.
The instance’s designated time hadn’t passed yet, but since the protective wall had collapsed, the instance might end early.
He opened the window and stepped inside, then both he and the window disappeared from underground.
Above ground, Yuan Cun, who had been waiting, paused slightly. He quickly looked back in the direction they had come from and waved his hand. “Go back!”
Meanwhile, this time the window didn’t drop him from a height. Instead, it firmly spat Xu Huo out onto solid ground. But as he stumbled forward a few steps, he came face-to-face with someone standing in the darkness.
To his right was a gear mechanism. With a clicking sound, a massive pointer outside the left window also turned. From Xu Huo’s position, he could see a rectangular object in the street covered in fungi—it was the car he had just abandoned.
What a coincidence. Not only had he failed to be teleported to the Cleanup Zone or Sunset Clown City, but he had been sent back to where he had just left—and on that very bell tower!
The person opposite him was undoubtedly the one who had been watching him earlier without him noticing.
Light from the outer street streamed in through the huge windows. The shadow of the pointer moved from the twelve o’clock position to the right, gradually passing Xu Huo and reaching the feet of the man opposite.
The man, standing a few meters from Xu Huo, wore an old leather coat, with wrinkled shirt and pants. He was tall, with a thick beard and long hair. When he lowered his head slightly, his eyes were hidden.
The man was folding paper birds, with four already at his feet. He was so focused that it seemed he hadn’t noticed the extra person in the room.
Xu Huo stepped back quietly, muttered “Sorry to disturb,” and headed downstairs.
Before he could leave the bell tower, Yuan Cun caught up. To prevent Xu Huo from escaping underground again, one of the players aimed a cannon at the clock tower and fired!
With a massive explosion, the glass of nearby buildings shattered. Broken doors and windows flew everywhere, becoming sharp projectiles that swept across the street, leaving marks on walls and the ground.
A few seconds later, the smoke cleared from the bell tower. Unexpectedly, the surrounding tens of meters of the street had been affected, but the bell tower itself, which had taken a direct hit, was completely undamaged—not even the glass on the clock face was cracked!
Yuan Cun and his group’s expressions changed slightly. But the next second, a small black shadow screeched as it pierced through the clock face and flew out, directly penetrating the player who had fired the cannon!
A large hole was punched through his heart. The player’s eyes widened as he fell from the rooftop, his life extinguished.
Then a second, third, and fourth black shadow flew out, piercing through both the clock glass and the thick walls without issue. In an instant, they claimed the lives of three more players. Only one of the targeted players barely escaped using a ticket.
The overwhelming strength terrified the remaining players, who immediately used their tickets to flee the scene.
The dead hadn’t even had a chance to use defensive props. It was clear that the player in the bell tower was far too strong—staying meant certain death!
In less than a second, all of Yuan Cun’s surviving players had fled. Yuan Cun himself didn’t leave. Instead, as if enraged, he activated a defensive prop and charged straight into the bell tower.
Xu Huo was on the first floor. He could sense Yuan Cun entering the tower. He planned to take this chance to slip out, but as soon as he stepped out the door, something crashed down from above!
He reflexively dashed to the diagonal intersection across the street. As he fled without stopping, he glanced back: Yuan Cun, who had been upstairs for less than five seconds, was now lying dead in the street!
(Chapter End)